1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to an automatic noodle making machine. More particularly, the present invention relates to improvement of a noodle making machine for automatically producing noodles such as "wheat vermicelli", "buck-wheat vermicelli", "Chinese vermicelli" or the like.
2. Background Art
In recent years, many requests have been raised from users for providing a noodle making machine which assures that plural kinds of noodles can be produced with a single noodle making machine.
A conventional noodle making machine of the foregoing type is constructed as disclosed in an official gazette of Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication NO. 3-201956 filed by a common applicant to the present invention.
According to this prior invention, the noodle making machine is equipped with a quantitative flour feeding unit which is fixedly mounted on a housing of the noodle making machine and includes a hopper for storing flour and a rotational driving mechanism for driving the quantitative flour feeding unit.
With this construction, when a different kind of flour is used for producing a different kind of noodle, it is necessary that the flour remaining in the hopper after completion of the preceding noodle making operation is removed from the hopper. To this end, for example, the flour remaining in an upper storing section of the hopper is scooped from the hopper by a hand ladle, while the flour remaining in a lower storing section of the hopper is discharged from the hopper by idly driving a rotational driving mechanism in the quantitative flour feeding unit. However, such a flour discharging operation of unwanted flour as mentioned above requires much time.
To obviate the foregoing problem, a proposal has been made with respect to a noodle making machine as disclosed in an official gazette of Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication NO. 61-85159 wherein the noodle making machine includes a plurality of flour storing units which are mounted on a housing of the noodle making machine such that one of the flour storing units is selectively exchanged with another one when a different kind of flour is used for producing a different kind of noodle. However, it has been pointed out as problems that the proposed noodle making machine is unavoidably constructed with large dimensions, causing it to be manufactured at an expensive cost and that some of the flour storing units are not necessary for all users.